Why oh why do ... dog owners pick up after their dogs and then chuck the filled bags in ditches/hedges or just leave them in the middle of the path !!! What is the matter with these people!! Do they not realise that the plastic bags do not 'break down' and that they actually cause more of a problem in many ways, than leaving the mess to rot. I am not saying do not clean up after dogs but surely common sense should tell them that dumping the bags anywhere but in a bin, is just as bad.

I agree and do take mine home or to a poo bin - but I also sympathise with people who have to carry them - we have walked our dogs along miles of towpaths without a single bin of any type on offer, it's not surprisingly people litter both with poo bags and with general rubbish, although I don't condone it. Perhaps British Waterways and the various councils could look into providing more bins in areas where this is a common problem.

I agree there should be bins to put your poo bags in, near us every lampost has a sign on to clean up after your dog, why can they not put a bin nearby also?

The Forestry Commission are sensible and only ask that dog poo be removed from the paths, and suggest kicking it or flicking it off with a stick, rather than picking it up and taking it away. Much more ecologically friendly.

I am an avid picker upper but it does make me wryly smile when I think of all those bags of poo being taken to landfill. Even the biodegradable ones can take an age to disappear. I do agree with the forestry commission in thats its much better to let rot naturally and quickly in a wood rather than adding it to a landfill. In towns and where people walk obviously its a different matter

Quite agree, I have been on some walks where people have hung their bags on the trees!  Disgusting!  Actually saw a woman attempt to leave a nappy bag and nappy by the side of a path on Woodland Trust land.  I told her to pick it up or i would follow her back to the carpark telling everyone we met what she had just done.  Makes me see red!

Urggh, thats almost worse. I've seen nappies lying around as well. Horrible.

While it would be nice if there were more poo bins around - I only know of three walks in the entire area where I live that have poo bins - I think it's time people stopped blaming others for not supplying things that make our lives easier :-). Yes more poo bins are needed but at the end of the day it is us dog walkers who are responsible for removing the poo produced by our dogs. If I have to walk several miles carrying a poo bag it's not so nice - but it's my dog, my mess so I just have to get on and do it.

With  lack of available funds and cutbacks being made all over the public sector I would prefer that money was spent elsewhere and dog owners took responsiblity for their dogs and their output. Yes it's a pain but also yes they are my dogs and my problem :-)

Yes I agree my dog my mess so if I have to carry it so be it. I cant get my headround people who happily bag it then hang it in trees ! 

"I'll pick it up on the way back" - they announce in a loud voice.  Horrible isn't it

We had a few complaints after a spate of tree decorating in our village and, after a message in our village magazine, it stopped.  There are always a few bags dumped on verges though and if I don't watch them avidly my dogs will mark over the bags, making it less likely that the 'owner' would pick it up on their way back!

I agree that there are places and times when it's better left for nature to deal with it, my raw fed dogs poo will crumble and disintegrate very quickly and when it's possible to do this it's better option than preserving poo in plastic bags for future generations to deal with.  However I also agree with the poster who said that dog owners should take responsibility for the mess their dogs create.  If it's necessary to pick it up then try and do so in a bio degradable bag and take to the most convenient bin.  I'm currently looking for a good bag so that I can walk further with mine if necessary.  More dog bins aren't always the best option.  They are quite expensive for councils to supply, are subject to vandalism, and need special collections - your normal garbage collectors don't collect from these in most local authority areas.

Our local vandals like to put fireworks in them in November!  Delightful children - their parents must be soooo proud!!

i was told by dog warden you can put poo in ANY bin it doesnt have to be a poo bin

The law states that poo bins have to be ion an area that can be serviced by a vehicle - think about it, employ a man to collect pooh bags along a canal??? where is he going to leave his truck!

Lucky for us most of our local walks have poo bins, but on our walk this morning in our local woods the bin was overflowing and had loads of bags on the floor around it. This made me mad because if people are taking the time to collect their dog's poo, at least the Council should be coming along and emptying the bins from time to time!

BTW anyone interested in bio degradable bags, I get nappy sacks from tesco, fully biodegradable and a nice bright blue colour. Good price also around 65p a packet. I buy a couple of packets at a time. They are a good size, and are not so thin you feel you're picking up the warm stuff with your bare hands... ewww!!!

> "I'll pick it up on the way back" - they announce in a loud voice.  Horrible isn't it

Some of us actually do you know ;-)  If i'm walking anywhere that I know I'm going to double back, it's a long walk and the dogs have gone near the start, I will leave bags - always in the same spots - and pick them up on the way back :-)

If I'm not going to double back then I will carry them - I used to have a small nylon shoulder bag just for full poo bags for the longer walks.

> If I have to walk several miles carrying a poo bag it's not so nice

No, but as you say, it is up to us to do it. Being prepared it's not such a big issue. If it's a long walk I take a small back pack, and several 'layers' of poo bag/carrier bag hides most smells particularly if you buy 'smelly' nappy sacks :) :)

Agree with every thing so far & I too use nappy sacks..much cheaper than the dog ones by Pedigree, although I prefer not to be able to see the contents....
I do think on my walks that if there are bags hanging from the hedges, that the person may aswell have left it to degrade naturally...although I am infuriated when dog owners do not pick up after their dogs, as it does give the rest of us a bad name!!

we have a couple of very large lakes around us where the forestry people take there 4x4 to patrol the lakes and check out the fishing etc and generally keep and eye on the park , not one dog bin at the sites and only one waste bin at the beg of the walks, so they should be able to supply dog poo bins to these lakes etc as a vehicle would be able to collect them but the council will not fund them in our area.

> I think it's time people stopped blaming others for not supplying things that make our lives easier

Yep!

Where I walk Buster, it's only a small orchard (you could walk around the whole thing in 15 mins at a brisk pace), there is a poo-bin at each end, so it's never too far to get to a poo-bin, but the walk is littered with dog mess. People use lack of bins as an excuse for not picking up, but when there are enough bins, many people still don't use them.

The people that will pick up, will do it regardless of bins being present or not, sadly the same goes for those that will NOT pick up - the bins/lack of bins makes no difference.

Defintely am astounded that people take the time to bend-down, bag a fresh poop, then leave it hanging in a tree or chucked in a hedge - if you can bag it, you can carry it home!

Leaving poo bags hanging etc - whether they are collected later or not - is also an eyesore, no different from littering and detracts from the pleasant surroundings :(

An old friend of mine used to come walking with me....poo was picked up, I carried home..still do....hers always ended up in trees hanging in the bag...she thought it was hilarious..I stopped going for walks with her and now we dont speak..she has new friends of the same idiotic views as hers.

The majority of towpaths can get small vehicles, either cars or at least those little quad bike things along it, but I take your point.

>The law states that poo bins have to be ion an area that can be serviced by a vehicle - think about it, employ a man to collect pooh bags along a canal??? where is he going to leave his truck!

There really is no excuse in my opinion. Dog bins are provided here but because they are all situated at the end of walks or pathways - and within easy access of roads (for collection purposes) the lazy individuals don't bother to "walk" their bags to the bins! They just drop/lob them wherever. In the open spaces locally, they do provide normal rubbish bins AND a sign stating that anyone found to be placing dog waste in those bins will be prosecuted. Fair enough - they provide dog bins for the purpose. I doubt very much that those intent of leaving filled poo-bags in ditches/hedges would use normal rubbish bins either!

>The majority of towpaths can get small vehicles, either cars or at least those little quad bike things along it, but I take your point.

However it'd be illegal to do so, because motorised vehicles aren't generally allowed on the towpaths ... in fact not all towpaths are open to cyclists either.

It's interesting to note that some of the most strident protestors about dog poo are other dog owners!

When we did our Parish Plan questionnaire I discovered that I cared more than many of our residents about this issue.  I think it's because I consider myself a responsible dog owner and, as a very visible and regular dog walker, I don't want to be blamed for the litter louts.

I'd love to know why some people bag it then leave it - they can't all have forgotten to collect it on their way back...

Sorry dogs a babe just tagging on. I'm of the opinion if you own a dog, you pick up. Prehaps because I've worked in care for so long I just can't see the disgust of poo, it just the body's left overs of the food we or the dog eats (yes my dog too has some fairly disgusting eating habits). Don't discriminate either as to were to pick up, footpath, woods or fields, what I leave the house with, I return with. Those who kick it under hedges make me mad, go picking fruit in the autum and I've ended up wearing wellingtons it's so bad.

> I'd love to know why some people bag it then leave it

I have just had this thought...one can be fined for not picking it up but does the ruling say it has to be disposed off/binned?? I cant remember what it actually says.

> I think it's because I consider myself a responsible dog owner and, as a very visible and regular dog walker, I don't want to be blamed for the litter louts.

That is one reason why it badgers me that people leave it.

Another is that Soli is coprophagic, it fluctuates, and at the moment she's in a phase of eating every bit of poo she can find on our walks.  If people picked it up, retraining her would be a heck of a lot easier!

And there's the whole risk of worms etc being spread.

And and, the whole thing wherein one person or one person's child steps in some, and from there dogs get stuck on leads forevermore or banned altogether (that happened at a public garden on the Wirral - one child stepped in one poo, and her father kicked up a stink - no dogs allowed now, all because one owner didn't pick up.

> It's interesting to note that some of the most strident protestors about dog poo are other dog owners!

I think this is very true. There is a walk near me which I call Dog S**T alley, there are bins at the start and and of the walk. A friend of mine lives around the corner from this and hadn't really noticed how bad it was until she had a baby recently and each and every time the buggy ended up with dog pooh all over the wheels :-(

I've personally made complaints to the council about this problem in the past. The main culprits are the elderly who walk and pay little to no attention to what their dog is doing, normally the dog is trailing way behind them. Its one thing to leave it in a field etc, but on a main pathway, NOT ON!!!
Now as for bags, don't get me started on that... Most of the South Downs Way doesn't have bins, so really you are best to leave the pooh in the fields as you go, or flick it off a pathway...

In our local park there are bins every few yards and people still leave it lying around. It is terrible. Short of employing pooperscoopers I'm not sure what else our council could do to make it more easy for dog owners! It makes me sick to see faeces on the floor, its a health hazard and gives good owners a bad name.

Great on a cold day though he he he!!

" dispose of" however that could be anything. We only leave a bag on the side of a path if we are walking back that way. A large area called farley mount has no bins and our two always go within 50 feet of the car, OH has those army trousers with lots of pockets and he pick's and pockets all the way around, then we pick up the odd two and bin at home.

I feel its my dogs, its my mess but there is ton's of the stuff all around the walk and lets not mention "orse pooh that my spaniel thinks is best Chanel!! smellie little sod. Jake's au de cologne is Fox - lovely in a white ruff and guarranteed to make you heave all the way home.

> Jake's au de cologne is Fox - lovely in a white ruff and guarranteed to make you heave all the way home.

Oh don't get me started - my Malinois girl is an absolute poo-seeking missile and never fails to find something to roll in. Fox poo smells bad yes, but wait until your dog finds a badger latrine! The worst part is that when she was having a roll on something nasty, my other (normally non-poo-rolling) dog thought: "Oooh that looks like fun, can I have a go?"

article on BBC 1 NOW about it Dirty rotten scoundrels.

I think alot of people only pick up poo as someone else close by when their dog does it...hence the dumping of the bag somewhere else on route.
Our poo bags get put on the tow bar and taken home or put in poo bins.

Badger now thats a smell I cant wait to get a whiff off. The worst ever was dead fish on a river bank in full sunlight - Im heaving thinking about that one. Needless to say they both got chucked in the river that day.

Essence of dead rat is spectacularly pungent; a smear of long-dead grass-snake behind the ears comes a close second.

> Badger now thats a smell I cant wait to get a whiff off.

I'm sure you can wait! It's not as bad as fox poo by any means; it's just there's a lot of it, and it's sloppy. More than enough to smear a dog and then some.

Im chuckling here thank you so much, when I get stressed talking pooh is a lot better than trying to deal with it at work!!! we ought to produce a pooh odor scratch and sniff!!!

> Badger now thats a smell I cant wait to get a whiff off. The worst ever was dead fish on a river bank in full sunlight - Im heaving thinking about that one. Needless to say they both got chucked in the river that day.

Ooh lovely yes, we had that week before last!  I had 5 dogs with me at a canal walk I've only ever been to doing behavioural work with a vizsla, figured we were passing so we'd have a run.  On the way out, every single dog had a sniff of a whacking great dried-out carp but left it be.

On the way back, Paige decided it was worth a roll after all and when I went to get her away from it, River realised what she was doing...

Now I have a very strong stomach - can stand fox poo etc no problem, just wait until it dries to brush it out.  But that really did make me heave, baths a plenty that day!!

Umm carp, I think we had a trout, River Itchen - OH walks them in every day I got the job for the next three days so we went into a huge field with a frisbee BUT I forget the stream further along - they didnt - got to work all wet and smellie and that was just me!"

i am often seen with a poo bag stuck in my window when driving home! keeps the smell outside the car.

> i am often seen with a poo bag stuck in my window when driving home! keeps the smell outside the car.

OMG has it ever fallen off? At speed on the motorway?

Flying down the moterway and something hits the windscreen in a little plastic bag who would be to blame

Actually it probably was a trout - not deep enough in the body for a carp, not at that size.  All I could think was 'carpe diem', that must have convinced me it was a carp lol!

Re. the poo bags on BBC - tis here:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00tvffj/Filthy_Rotten_Scoundrels_Episode_1/

29 bags in one tree, absolutely vile!

>Flying down the moterway and something hits the windscreen in a little plastic bag who would be to blame

ive had one split whilst hanging on my tow bar, wondered why the back end of my car was covered in poo ..... took me a while to work it out !!

My son had someone throw a dirty nappy out the window on the motorway - it hit his windscreen :-O Not only was it a vile thing to do it was very dangerous as well. As incensed as he was he was relieved he wasn't riding his motorbike or in an open top sports car.

Funny story one of my friends was a twin brother lived in London - he's about 50 now. They took a load of dog pooh in a tin with a banger and shut the lid. They all headed for the conservatory but Richard shut his brother out, it went off and there was his brother's outlined up the conservatory window's in - well you get the picture!!!!!!!!

Oh chucked one in my car and it went under my seat. he forgot it.
Ever sat in a car at 5pm on a hot hot day after baking pooh in a bag in a confined space.
I drove his home and he my car that night!

OMG has it ever fallen off? At speed on the motorway? eek

Where I live I am fortunate to have lovely walks in the country only a few miles from home, sedate lifestyle, no motorway driving, poo bag very secure with the knotted end inside the car means No accidents.